


Don't Need To Be Here

by Elizabeethan



Series: It's About Bloody Time Extras [3]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff, Sort Of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-17
Updated: 2020-10-17
Packaged: 2021-03-09 00:00:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27055324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elizabeethan/pseuds/Elizabeethan
Summary: The 4th of July in Storybrooke, as told by Neal
Relationships: Captain Hook | Killian Jones/Emma Swan
Series: It's About Bloody Time Extras [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1971553
Comments: 14
Kudos: 49





	Don't Need To Be Here

**Author's Note:**

> The first of several (planned) one shots taking place in the It’s About Bloody Time universe! I wrote more, I just didn’t plan on writing them.

Neal doesn’t come back to Storybrooke often. Usually, it’s for holidays or long weekends when he can justify the hour-long drive by staying at Granny’s. His move to Portland was a strategic one—there’s only so much work to be found in a made-up, magical town, and we can’t all just give ourselves the job of Sheriff.

He wishes Emma would try and persuade Henry to visit him in the city more often. Of course, he supposes it’s hard to convince a 16-year-old to do anything, but he certainly thought that Emma would understand the appeal of city life. He’s always surprised, actually, that she chose to stay in Storybrooke when Portland isn’t too far away.

Neal finds himself in Storybrooke this time for the 4th of July. The holiday falls on a Wednesday, so he decided to surprise Henry and take the second half of the week off from work and stay through to Sunday. Henry is 16, though, so eliciting any sort of excited reaction from him is difficult, Neal has discovered.

Sunscreen is being applied to every child on the beach, and cold beer is in the hand of almost every adult. There’s plenty of food, too: pasta salad; potato salad; deviled eggs; baked beans; and David and Hook are starting to hand out burgers and hot dogs. Despite his desire to be back in Portland with Julie, he has to say, Mary Margaret makes a mean potato salad.

He’ll never be able to call Hook anything other than Hook. He’s had two hands for upwards of three years now, apparently courtesy of Emma, but he’ll always be the ruthless, murderous Captain Hook to Neal. When he found out that Emma restored his hand a few weeks after their kid was born, he couldn’t help but laugh. She could say all she wanted that she could look past his mutilation, but that obviously turned out to be untrue in the end.

“Burger or dog, Neal?” the pirate asks, and Neal can’t find it in himself to respond verbally, choosing instead to take a hot dog off the table and cover it with mustard and ketchup.

His son is here (albeit spending most of his time with Hook’s kid). The food is good. The beach is nice. And despite all of this, Neal finds that he’d rather be anywhere else.

He’s here for his son, he reminds himself.

The sun begins to set hours later, and Neal glances around and sees Emma’s three—three? —three-year-old mini-me crawling up David’s leg with her mother and father nowhere to be found. How irresponsible to leave her alone like this in the middle of a crowded beach. When he continues his scan of the sand, he notices the parents in question walking away from the horde of partygoers together, hand in hand, and he rolls his eyes. Leave it to them to put themselves over the safety of their damn kid.

He looks back at David and Mary Margaret, wondering if they're as annoyed as he would be if he had been left with the rug rat, but all he sees in their eyes is elation. Mary Margaret looks at the pair as if she knows something big is about to happen. She’s practically vibrating where she stands and is squeezing David’s bicep with both hands. David reaches down and picks up the kid, tossing her in the air briefly and catching her as her blonde hair bounces and she squeals happily, and Neal catches the word _excited_ leave his mouth. Henry’s with them too, he realizes, and he takes Mary Margaret’s freed hands in his.

In his confusion, Neal glances back over to Emma and Hook and his heart sinks to his stomach. Emma’s got her hands covering her mouth, and if he were closer to them, he probably would’ve seen the tears coming out of her eyes. Hook is… Hook’s on one knee, holding up his hands towards her. He see’s Emma nod enthusiastically and tackle Hook to the ground, and Neal cringes at the sand that must be getting in their hair and clothes.

Moments later, after too much kissing and touching for their place in public, Emma climbs off of him and sits beside him as he slides a ring onto her left hand. The kid scampers clumsily past Neal, nearly falling over along the way as she makes her way over the uneven terrain, and runs straight into Emma’s waiting arms. Emma hoists her into the air and appears to be squeezing the life out of her as she kisses her adorably fat cheeks. (Did Neal just call Hook’s kid adorable? He didn’t mean to.)

He hears the kid screeching as her father takes her from her mother’s arms and tosses her into the air, similarly to how David had. Henry runs after her into Emma’s arms and hugs her tighter than he thinks he’s ever hugged Neal. The hug lasts for way too long. Neal knows Henry must be uncomfortable with how long the exchange goes on.

Mary Margaret and David walk over hurriedly next, both hugging Emma at the same time before David picks her up and spins her around one, two, three times. Henry takes the kid from Hook, tickling her and nuzzling her button nose with his own, so that Mary Margaret can crush Hook in a rib-cracking hug. She kisses his cheek, and David shakes his hand and pulls him in for a hug as well. Neal wonders what aside from their apparent approval of Hook has changed over the years since he’s been gone.

Emma still has tears in her eyes when she shows off the ring to Mary Margaret, and now that the family has walked closer to where Neal has planted himself in the sand, he sees that the diamond is freaking _huge._ He thinks he only sees one, but the size of it makes up for that fact. Emma starts showing the ring off the Ruby and Belle, and Belle takes out her phone, presumably showing her the photos she had taken of the proposal. Apparently, everyone here knew it was going to happen except for Emma. And Neal. He even hears the kid ask, “Momma was excited? Daddy and Cowine surprise you?” and hell, she was in on it too.

In his distraction, he hadn’t even noticed that Henry has made his way over to him, taking a seat next to him as the sun sets and the fireworks are prepared. Neal bumps his shoulder with his own in greeting, then says, “exciting day, huh?” with any trace of a smile absent from his face.

“You don’t have to act happy,” his son responds. Neal draws his brows in close together and turns to face him.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, it’s clear you don’t want to be here. You’ve always hated Killian, and now you resent Corrine, too. You don’t have to act like you're happy for them because I know you're not.” Neal isn’t sure how to respond. He isn’t sure what he’s done to make Henry believe this. He may not be very happy about it, but he doesn’t think that he’s made that overly obvious tonight. “I know what happened. In Phoenix.”

Neal’s heart is in his stomach again. “What?”

“I’m tired of acting like you're some amazing, upstanding father.”

“Who the hell told you about that?” he asks, already mentally preparing to sock Hook in the face for poisoning his son against him.

“No one had to tell me. I found out months ago when I found Regina’s research from when mom came to Storybrooke the first time. You set her up and you left her in jail, and that’s why she gave me up.”

“Hey—”

“Although, I haven’t really seen you since Christmas, so I guess I haven’t had a chance to express my anger towards you.”

“Henry—”

“I don’t want to hear any excuses. You screwed my mom over, how could you do that?”

“I—”

“And then you couldn’t even stick around once you found out about me. You stayed with me for a year and then you moved to Portland.”

“Kid—”

“I’m not a fucking kid. Save yourself the money you were gonna spend on Granny’s. I don’t need you to be here until Sunday.”

Henry’s gone from Neal’s side as quickly as he’d arrived. Neal looks up and see’s him making his way towards Emma and Hook and the kid again, blessedly interrupting perhaps their thousandth kiss this evening. The fireworks start moments later, but Neal isn’t around long enough to see the finale.

He heads to the car and is back in Portland before ten.


End file.
